Re: CD Sales Down

The Repair Guy wrote:
Rufus <not@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

The Repair Guy wrote:
--snip--
Suppose someone believes in one god, but his god has completely different attributes than yours. How could either of you know he was right? Are you both right? Neither? Hard to say, isn't it.
Yes - and I'm ok with that. As long as the other believer and I can agree that in concept One God is God then we have to be believing in the "same" God if there is only One.

Suppose guy A believes his god created the universe and then abandoned it. Guy B believes
his god is still around, supervising. You can keep
piling up hypotheticals, but there comes a point when it's obvious that God A has almost nothing in common with God B- except the name, which is only vaguely defined.
Imagine that you're neither of these two guys (like,
say, me). Each guy tells you about his god, each guy is convinced there's only one god, and his god
(of course) is the only one. Neither guy can or will show you evidence to support his view. They both 'know' they're right.
What do you, a third party, think? Both of them are
delusional? The more articulate believer managed to convince you, so his god is God? There can be only one god (unsupported claim), so one (maybe both) of these guys is hopelessly confused?


It's my belief in "One being One" that allows me to at least respect if not agree with the other guy's beliefs - belief is not God, it's just belief. Like I said before, I believe God talks to everyone, but that He doesn't say the same thing to everyone. If that's what they believe, then that's what they believe, but it has no bearing on what I believe or hear within myself. If God is infinite then He can be anything to anyone - I have no reason or need to judge the what or how of it.

But that that says absolutely nothing about HOW to believe. That has to come from within the individual and for themselves. But I can still hold onto "God being God" as a basis for commonality. At least, that's how I look at it.

'How to believe' is skipping a step, IMO. What to
believe ought to come first.


They sort of come together, IMO. Especially if you're very introspective, like myself. Belief evolves - it's not a static thing.

--snip--
Their day-to-day behavior compared to their 'moral code' = hypocrisy. I realize not all Christians are like
this. Not all of ANY group is like this, I hope.
Here I have to agree, and again it forms the basis of my disdain for large organizations.

I get the 'large organization' part. But I don't get the morally superior tone I hear from these individual
Christians, in contrast to their behavior.


I guess I don't hear much of that from individuals I encounter...at least not since I left "the land of Billy Grahm". But when I do hear that in large and concentrated volume I always chalk it up to the organization and not the individual. It's pretty easy for me to see through individuals to a "party line", if only because I was raised alongside one and rebelled.

--snip--
I'm sitting down. I have a fresh cup of coffee.
I'm ready to hear the evidence for your god :-)
You would have to live my life - I could tell you about all sorts of situations I've found myself in and gotten
out of, Biblical allegory that either in part or in total (some verbatim) have occurred in my life, and you still wouldn't call it "evidence" because it wouldn't speak to you as being "objective". My life and what
I've experienced in it are my evidence. But just like my belief, it's mine alone and not anyone else's.

Can you give one specific example?


I had a particularly bad break up very young that I took very hard - to this day, that was "the woman I was meant to marry" as far as my heart is concerned. Anyway, I went home to my parents for a weekend and had a bicycle accident and had to have my mouth wired shut for a month, which gave me something else to think about and got me past it all. The night I got my jaw wired, one of the neighbors from across the street came by my parents and pointed out a verse in Luke about a guy that had an experience in the temple and when he came out - "God shut his mouth" because God wasn't ready for this particular experience to be shared yet. Ma read that to me, but I had already read it and knew about it.

All the doctors told me that I would probably either loose all of my teeth, or at a minimum have to have root canal on every tooth in my head because my teeth are fitted so close together that they had to stitch the wires above my gum line between the roots where there is room instead of between each tooth. I had my "accident" in 1984. I still have all of my teeth intact, and no root canal work.

--snip--
How do you explain "blue" to a blind man?
http://tinyurl.com/2baggd
This is about photography instead of 'blue', but I think it's worth reading. That's a shaky argument.
That's actually very interesting, but in the end it all hinges upon building the FAITH of the blind man that what is occurring is indeed the truth.

Any part could be verified by a third party - chosen by him, chosen at random, etc. If the blind guy just
flat-out trusts no one, no procedure, none of his own
senses, he must know absolutely nothing for sure.
Skepticism carried to an extreme is just as dumb
as gullibility carried to an extreme, IMO.


Yup. But it still comes down to faith in something as a basis to limit or restrain skepticism. "Trust" in something - be it friends, "fact", or one's own senses. Because as you so rightly point out, there are no "absolutes".

Likewise all the tests which follow are merely attempt to further weight that faith. In the end the blind man (and the rest of us) develop a gut level feeling for the truth, but still don't really have an absolute quantification of it.

"Gut level feelings' are sometimes laughably wrong, or they only tell you what you want to hear. There are
areas, believe it or not, where I'm so ignorant that any 'gut level feeling' I might get would be no better than rolling dice.


Heh...looking back over my own life, EVERY time I've gotten into trouble the root cause is because I didn't follow my first gut instinct about a situation. Like I mentioned before, I've paid some pretty high prices for putting "reason" ahead of feeling...especially when it comes to listening to myself.

--snip--
I think using language is an art.

It can be. When it's at the 'I want food' level, it's more
of a tool.


Until it come to getting what you want to eat - steak vice gruel. Or what you need to eat - in my case, I can't have tomatoes or anything acidic because of my IBD. So I have to be specific.

Something I do that drives people up a wall is listen
to what people DON'T say. No one ever stops to consider that and I trip up people all the time with what they don't say - "I can tell from the questions you're NOT asking that you haven't read my document". I learned that from my art teacher showing me how to look at a Zen garden properly...
I just extrapolated the principle to language.

That's a good point. Of course, you have to have
some familiarity with a subject to know something's
missing...


Not really. Sometimes absence is ignorance on the part of the speaker, too. If you're actively listening and learning in context it can be pretty easy to spot.

--snip--
You can argue any way you want, but the argument
from ignorance is a fallacy: http://tinyurl.com/nlv25
IOW, you may as well make an ad hom attack, or
overwhelm the other person with volume.
Now you've figured out the true nature of lawyers...

Learned that almost 30 years ago in my divorce :-P


Bummer...I feel for anyone that has to go through that. "Reason ahead of feeling" has kept me from being divorced about four times over, I think. But then again, I've never known what it's like to have a wife either...maybe if I'd set reason aside one time and went with my feeling that one time might have worked.

...but there's also a mathematical approach called
"solving the inverse problem" that uses argument
from ignorance to great success and aplomb. Start with the answer you desire, and derive the problem...

That's not the argument from ignorance. http://tinyurl.com/nlv25


It sort of is - I used to design fan blades for jet engines based not on what I wanted the fan blade to do, but what I wanted the air around the blade to do. I started the process "ignorant" of what the metal should look like, and ended up with a metal blade as a by-product of what I wanted to constrain the air to do - only because I believed that that's what the air should be doing to get the result I was looking for from the start of the process.

--snip--
The argument is moot, because there is no "evidence" one way or the other.
One side claims something: a god exists. If you don't have any evidence, don't make a claim. This is exactly why I'm not a strong atheist. (and why is the word "evidence" in quotes above?)
Because I believe "evidence" as we've been discussing it is really only "evident" to the individual that believes in it.

Then it's not 'evidence' as the word is commonly used. Evidence is used to convince someone who
DOESN'T already believe.


It's only claimed to be "evidence". As you point out, it's a tool. And a tool in the right hands can be used to build anything. "Evidence" is also subjective in the absolute...after you've done the "convincing" with it, it's even more so.

Everyone has their own "evidence" for what they believe in. That "evidence" may be (and probably is) completely unfounded or unjustified
to someone outside of a particular experience.

This may be a person's reason(s) for believing. Calling it 'evidence' is misleading, IMO.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence
"Evidence in its broadest sense includes anything
that is used to determine or demonstrate the truth of an assertion."

Key word = demonstrate.


Key word - "truth". What is "truth" in the absolute, really? Anything you can get enough people to agree upon in aggregate can become "truth".

All either side has is belief.
Strong atheists and theists have beliefs. I don't.
I think you have plenty of beliefs - you've just never really sat down and tried to catalog them.

We were talking about 'belief' WRT the existence
of a god; not 'beliefs' in general. I don't have any
beliefs WRT a god. You do. Strong atheists do.


Certainly you have a "belief" WRT God - you don't believe because you can't make God "evident" to yourself. That's still a belief, "strong" or "weak".

--snip--
I myself have come to see the New Testament in a different light through the years after learning that it was compiled by committee and parts were thrown out. Doesn't alter my belief in God or my faith, because I have more than a Book as
the source of it.

I think it's dishonest that the people who publish bibles don't make that clear up front - parts were
left out, parts were added to promote different agendas, no one knows who wrote any of the books, etc., etc. That it can be considered 'the
word of god' is hysterical, IMO.


No, I think they do know who actually wrote them, but the lack of inclusion and the history of having clergy and laymen in order to maintain the power of "the church" only served and serves to further divide people from faith, IMO. People sometimes argue to me that the Bible was "written by men whom were inspired by God". I always counter that I could be inspired to write their life story, but that doesn't mean I'd get it all right. I sort of look at the Bible that way - I have to take from it and keep the parts that speak to me personally, and continually look and introspect for myself in order to find what is meant for me. I no longer consider it to be a "complete" document.

I've heard that the entirety of the Dead Sea Scrolls isn't released because there are things in them that challenge the very foundation of Judaism...I for one would like to know what they say.

--snip--
It's the Word of God, written by MEN whom were
inspired by God. That don't mean they got it right...
what it means is that I have to look at it for what it is a decide for myself what inspires ME.

What's the point of the 'divinely inspired' claim?
God let them screw up, and still call it 'the word of god'?


I can still see it as "the Word of God", but that doesn't always and absolutely mean that Word was meant for me, or anyone else. If someone has a revelation, I consider that a very personal thing. If they try to turn that revelation into a following, I get leery.

--snip--
it's an attempt at the codification of God's Law. And no - our laws are definitely NOT known and understood by many, let alone even understandable.
Not what I said. I said ->the consequences of breaking a law<- are known, or at least understandable.
And that's what I was getting at - neither the laws nor the consequences are known or understandable in most cases.

Most laws that directly affect us - traffic laws, petty
theft, grand theft, manslaughter, arson, etc - have
understandable or easy to find consequences.
You're stretching, IMO.


Nope. I got rear ended sitting at a stop light once...the guy was uninsured. The cops wouldn't even come file a report for my insurance because there was no bodily injury involved. Even though it's a crime to be driving on the street without insurance, and the guy had also then committed a moving violation while driving in non-compliance with the law. Then the guy skipped on even paying my deductable. The "known consequences" were totally and completely obviated by sheer laziness and incompetence.

Besides, our discussion has been centered around the totality of law, not just "familiar" or "common law". Ignorance excuses no man. Period. At least it's not supposed to...in my cited example total familiarity on the parts of both parties involved seems to have excused the guilty and punished the innocent - I got stuck with an $800 bill for the repair of my truck.

--snip--
This might be a good time to ask - what do you think your god is? I don't mean hair color or anything, but you must give him/it some attributes when you think about him/it. ??
All powerful, unfathomable. Perfect. Beyond my limited ability to comprehend, but worthy of the attempt. Male. Benevolent for the most part, irrevocably terrible to fall afoul of. A guide, if not an absolute protector. A redeemer of my mistakes, but patient enough to allow me to make them for myself.
And you got this information... how?
I got this information the same way I got my faith - I looked within myself. I assume other do the same, but reach different sets of attributes. These are mine and mine alone.

How is this different from just making up whatever you want?


It's not. Only that there's a fine line between "just making stuff up" and introspective, reflective belief that becomes part of your approach to living your life. But that's what free will and self determination are all about.

--snip--
I know of several instances where the "sins of the father" are held against the son - even if only perceptually. Ever wonder what it must be
like to be Monika Lewinsky's dad? It's human nature.
Can we stick to ->punishment for violation of a law<-? Sure, there are lots of examples of fallout
from an act or behavior.
Give me an example of the punishment for a specific violation of a specific law follows through generations, please.
Gun control. I am being specifically punished and my "right" to bear arms is being specifically
infringed even though I've never shot anyone.

If you're nailed for carrying concealed without a license, are your kids or descendants punished? Yes __ No __


Yes. Because they don't have the right either - a "right" which is supposedly guaranteed under law.

--snip--
Goes back to what I said about attempting to
"know the mind of God" being a futile effort because that is the very nature of being God.
Just looking at his/its behavior as told in the bible. There is nowhere else to look that I'm aware of.
Look inside yourself... IMO, that's an even better guide than the Book.
God is an atheist?
To you... I'd like to see you resolve that, though. For me He's something different.

Apparently he can be whatever anyone wants him
to be. There aren't many real-world things like that.
Almost enough to make one suspicious...


Yes - but as I've said before, that's the "nature of being God", IMO. I might become suspicious of other people (and am), but I see no reason to become suspicious of God.

There are lots of situations in the "real world" where people become whatever they want to be - acting is probably the most prevalent. Just plain growing up and choosing a career is another.

--snip--
Again, you're switching 'objective evidence' and 'objectivity'. True objectivity is an ideal. Objective evidence is not.
I think "objective anything" is an ideal. We pay people big money to spin evidence into what we'd like it to show all the time, and admire them
for their ability to do so.
Granted. But the evidence was objective before the spin was applied.
"Objective" to whom?

'Objective' means 'whom' is irrelevant. Are you
being difficult on purpose?


No. But I'm pressing the point that "objectivity" is highly dependent on POV in the "real world".

To the individual that believed in it maybe. To someone that doesn't believe maybe not.

"Objective' means belief is irrelevant.


I'm saying that that isn't possible in the absolute - it's only an "ideal", like you said.

--snip--
If you get a speeding ticket because you didn't see the limit sign, you still have to pay the fine,
right? No excuse.
That's just the 'getting caught' part. No one who can read is ignorant of speed limits, and the fines are easy to look up.
So, as long as you don't get caught, anything goes?

You've been saying the law and the consequences
for breaking it aren't understandable, then you used
the speeding ticket example. The speed limit laws are obvious - there are signs every X hundred feet, seems like - and it's not hard to find out the fine is $X for X MPH over, $Y for Y MPH over, etc. Where's the 'hard to understand' part?


I only used the speed limit as an example. I live out in the middle of nowhere, so no, there aren't limit signs every X feet. Yet you're still liable.

But what I meant is that for every one you do understand there are a million more that you don't, and probably have never even heard of. Are you aware that if you sell your PC out of the country and it has the wrong thing on it, or is a certain type of device that you could be liable for heavy fines and/or imprisonment for violation of export control or maybe even trade in arms treaty, depending on the technology involved? Probably not...and you're probably not the only one - yet you're still liable.

--snip--
Didn't the god say "... or you will surely die"? If not, I'm completely wrong here. If he/it did, that was the incomprehensible part - A&E had never seen a human die.
It's pretty much accepted that to "die" in the theological context means "separation".

Are there any other bible words that have meanings
completely unrelated to their everyday use that I should know about?


Probably. Assuredly. But "death" is the one that comes most readily to my mind. "Life" on the other hand can also mean "union with God". I'd gather that it stems from the evolution of language over the millennia, and the use of parable as illustration.

That, and the fact that the Book is a translation - mostly from the Latin, but a translation nonetheless and things get lost and argued over when they are translated - we're back to "language as art" in this respect. And there are a few differing translations as well - so yes, all that also colors the way I think it.

I've got an interesting CD with William S. Burroughs reading a passage about Egyptian mythos and "the death beyond death - soul death". I think the concept was pretty clear, even if it wasn't our concept.

There are lots of 'concepts'. Do you think every one
is worth serious consideration? If so, you have your
hands full. If not, how do you differentiate?


Yes - I've always believed in "learning as much as you can about as much as you can". And yes, that's a handful. I don't "differentiate" as much as "catalog". Then as I've said, I take away what speaks to me, and leave the rest.

--snip--
Facts can be verified. If it's a 'fact' only to you and it can't be verified, it's more of a 'notion'.
Not always - verify the exact time of the origin of the universe. It's a fact that the universe exists.
Verify how and when it came into existence.
* I don't have to. I made no claims WRT the origin.
That wasn't the point of my example...

What was your point? The exact time of the origin of the universe is not a fact. It's unknown, AFAICT.
Yes, it's a fact that the universe exists. Anyone can
verify that.


Then it should also be a "fact" that the universe came into existence at a precise time, and you should be able to verify it as such. Yet that "fact" remains unverified and unknown and people just take it to be true on faith...based on the "fact" that we "know" or "perceive" that a thing we call the "universe" exists to us.

"Fact" is whatever people take it to be, really.

* You're confusing 'explain' with 'verify'.
Nope. You can give me any explanation and/or answer you like - verify it though, please.

See above. You verify claims, statements, or facts; not unknowns.


You claim that it's a fact that the universe exists - then by extension it also has to be a fact that the universe came into existence at some precise time, in some precise manner - verify that "fact" for me, please.

--snip--
* The last time I checked, if a guy gets convicted
for murder, his kids, cousins, etc. don't do time
for him or with him.
They may not do institutional time, but the community may exact it's own form of retribution.
That's not the law. The law punishes the perp, not his family & descendants.
The law punishes everyone, and not equally. If you
spend enough time watching the system, you'll see
that.

I have seen that. But, corrupt and unfair as our legal
system is, it still doesn't punish descendants for the
crime of an ancestor. Unlike the bible god...


I don't know about that..."generational cycle". That's punishment to me.

--snip--
You're assuming that 'having bias' means 'having
bias toward the situation you're apathetic about'.
No - any bias at all, because that bias has the potential of becoming relevant to your decision.

Not if the bias is completely unrelated.


Oh yeah - even if it's supposedly "unrelated". The defendant is wearing a red tie, and I hate red. Red ties have nothing to do with breaking the speed limit, but I might totally hold that against him.

--snip--
Who's to say they wouldn't if we just left him alone,
though? After all, it worked for Napoleon...
Napoleon WAS Napoleon. The patient isn't.
...maybe he was, maybe he wasn't... some thought he was crazy, right?

Maybe. But not for believing he was Napoleon.
That was grounded in reality.


In Napoleon's reality. So if these people were only to legally change their names to "Napoleon", they'd no longer be crazy?

--snip--
What I'm getting at is that "reality" itself is only a construct. People (including you and me) create their own "realities" to suit their own needs and desires. Back to the "unreasonable man" hypothesis.
See the part about the bus. Create a personal force field in your reality, then stand in front of the bus. If the bus is only 'someone else's reality', and if you can make it insubstantial by believing,
there's no way you'll be hurt. But solipsists never seem to want to test this... :-|
...but who really knows what was on the minds of those whom do, or might still be there?

Those who do what? Might be where? Are you going to test the bus example or not? :-)
[side note: you're mixing up 'who' and 'whom']


Ok - WHOM stand in front of buses. And get killed. Or jump off buildings...and get killed. Or even just die of natural causes. Nobody knows, really.

....I'll get to test it one day...I just won't be standing in front of a bus. I'm waiting on a call back from my doc right now...

--snip--
There is no reason she should be valuable to
you or anyone else, because you don't have
the same shared experiences. As far as explaining why she's so valuable to me - well,
that's too personal for a newsgroup.
And that's my point - in the end, it really doesn't matter to anyone but you and requires no "justification", and that's as it should be. I feel the same way about my own beliefs when it comes to matters of God.
I hadn't mentioned a belief.
You implied one - I'm sure you trust your lady? And I'm sure you do so because you believe in her.

I trust her because of time spent together. I didn't meet her and suddenly trust her. IOW, no belief.


You learned to believe in her based on your time spent together. And you still do, or you wouldn't be together. Fortunately for both of you, that trust (which is really just another way of saying that you believe) and faith is shared.

--snip--
The fact that a person argues can be an indication
that they at least think.
The fact that they're a lawyer means they LIKE to argue. In fact, they probably have a passion for it...
I like peace more than to allow getting any of THAT on me...

I like peace, too, but I still like to argue. Do you play chess? I think arguing is similar.


I used to love to play chess, but I lost my whole muse for playing games altogether someplace...I think it was when I realized I had the potential for a gambling problem with cards - I like to play more than I like to win, and that's bad.

I don't particularly "like" to argue. But I do like open discourse, and learning things from it. Most people don't really know how to argue, anyway - they just know how to get mad. Was one of the biggest problems between me and my last - if logic didn't fit her delusion she'd throw a tantrum like a two year old; if she was high on top of it it could trigger a complete personality switch and the criminal in her would come out. Her delusion was reality and that was that...yelling and screaming were all that ensued. My whole life became nothing but trying to avoid arguments...and I couldn't more often than not, she'd just pick an excuse for one...

--snip--
Regardless of what the bullet hole means to you, it's still there, and it's still objective evidence - whether anyone looks at it objectively or not.
That's really hard to say, isn't it? If I look at it with bias, it's not really objective, is it?
If you look at it with a bias, YOU'RE not being
objective. The bullet hole is objective evidence. Your perception of it is subjective.
The bullet hole doesn't look at itself, stand up, and make a statement.

No one said it did. It's passive.


And therefore also can't defend itself.

Some biased individual does. And another biased individual may say something different.

Yup. That doesn't change the bullet hole, though.


Changes it's "relevance", though.

If you tell me it's a .22 cal hole and I look at it and
think it's more of a .38 size one and decide to completely ignore it, what is it then?
You can think it's a zit, and it'll still be a bullet hole.
Whatever size it was, it won't change just because
you think it's bigger or smaller.
No - but what I do with it will change... if I think it's a zit, I may send for a dermatologist instead of the coroner.

Or a faith healer. Whoever you send for, the hole hasn't changed. This is the point.


Sort of. The hole "changes" depending on how it's perceived. If I'm a really savvy lawyer and get it thrown out, then to the jury it's not even supposed to be there.

I don't think it's that simple.
I think it is. The complexity comes with interpreting
evidence to say what you want it to say; not with
the evidence itself.
And that's what I'm getting at.

You keep implying that bias in interpretation means
that evidence is no longer objective. My point is that
the evidence itself doesn't change.


My point is that the perception of the evidence is more important than the "evidence" itself. Particularly when it comes to basing any sort of decision or action on it.

--snip--
Who's reality?
Reality. The bus that hits you when you step in
front of it, whether you think you're invincible or not, or whether you believe the bus is 'real' or not. It doesn't matter that in 'your' reality the bus might be a cream puff. It'll still knock you down, and the stuff getting mopped up won't be cream.
Depends on what happens to consciousness
after death.
No, it doesn't. Even if your 'soul' ascends to the planet Boron in the Noxema galaxy, the bus still killed you.
Has it really? If I still exist on Boron... I've only changed form.

Unless there's any evidence for 'life after death', you've only 'changed form' from alive to dead. Maybe your 'soul' was absorbed by the bus. You can 'maybe' your way into anything.


And that's my point. Nobody really knows for sure, do they? But we'll all get to find out for ourselves one day...

--snip--
There are many realities...
Let's start with the bus, then. That reality. Can you show me another 'reality' where the bus would just pass through you like you were a cloud, instead of slamming you to the pavement?
Yeah - virtual reality. Virtual reality is so "real" that people use it to train to go kill "real" people, learn to drive "real" cars, have "2nd lives", learn to fly "real" airplanes. And that's just one example.

The word "virtual' in your example means 'not real'. Can you show me another reality where the bus would just pass through you like you were a cloud,
instead of slamming you to the pavement? Short answer: no, you can't. You can IMAGINE all
sorts of fantasies where natural laws don't apply,
but that's not the same thing.


But the distinction is that "virtual" reality is still real enough to make someone believe enough to make it "real" in the "real" world. If that's the case, how "virtual" is it, really?

if there were only one, life would be MUCH easier.
I think people manufacture 'realities' because the
'real' one is unpleasant for them, too hard to figure out, doesn't make them feel powerful enough, etc.
And I'd agree.

But you've said there are numerous realities.


Yes - "virtual" reality is one, delusion is another, culture is yet another. But I still stand by my statement that life would be easier if there were just one...but there ain't.

As I've said, I've witnessed that much closer than I'd like to have. But that doesn't make that reality any
less "real".

A dream is real to the person having it. We don't call that 'reality'. Why not?


"We" ain't "me". And that's why there's more than one "reality".

Finally figured out that I've been making a big mistake thinking there is only one reality.
I'd really like to hear the 'thinking' behind that one.
Not so much thinking as bearing witness - trying to pull someone out of a "false reality" that is nothing but "real" to them being the most personal I can "think" of.

If the 'reality' is only real to them, it's not reality.
Reality can be verified by comparing your perception
with the next person's.


It may be able to be confounded, but it can't be "verified" if the other individual is "secure" in their own version of it. In my ex's "reality" the brutality of being used as a prostitute served a "higher good" within the context of a culture. But let her hear a story on the news about someone being tortured, or even hear the news a all - present her with the "verifiable facts" of prostitution, and get ready for mood swings and tantrums...

Two political parties live in different "realities"... unfortunately no one questions either of them to the point of coming up with a viable third. There are countless such examples.

And all of them equally valid. The two parties may see reality differently (debatable), but that doesn't mean there's more than one reality. This is just a variation on two people looking at the bullet hole. No matter what the two people see or think, the hole does not change to fit their beliefs.


Sure it does. It's all just a matter of who comes out on top as to who's "reality" wins.

--snip--
I'd wager that there are some folk that have built a world view based on a lack of belief in leprechauns and/or fairies - I think they're called
"Christians"...
I thought they built their worldview on a belief in Jesus.
...and I thought Jesus didn't believe in leprechauns and/or fairies?

He didn't leave a diary, or anything. He might've
believed in Ra, for all anyone knows.


Maybe, but I doubt it...Ra might also have been the God of Abraham, too. but I doubt that as well.

--snip--
Suppose I say "The car that just drove by is black." If the car was black, the statement is true. If the car was green, the statement is false. It can be verified by any number of third parties
looking at the car, by analyzing the paint, etc. Why don't you think this can be verified? Which
part requires faith?
I have to believe in all of your verification methods -
This isn't difficult. If someone has eyes and knows
his colors, he's qualified.
From your POV, he's qualified if he believes his eyes. From my POV he has the option not to.

Apply some of this skepticism to your god belief(s).


Already have - I made my own choice, based on my own experience and inner voice. And I still search.

--snip--
but in the end I have to believe any and all of what you and all those people say. It all requires some amount of faith... maybe not a lot, but some. Even faith in my own eyes.
If you doubt your own senses, you may as well check yourself in right now...
Ever experienced time compression? I have. I had a guy open a parachute in my face in freefall, about 2000 feet above the ground. I hit his partially open chute, bounced off it, and deployed my own main at about 1800 feet, about six seconds from death. Whole thing must have taken less than a second, but to me it was about like 5 minutes - I distinctly recall seeing the chute opening and evaluating three courses of action before I decided I had to hit the chute. I went from falling at 120 mph to hitting that nylon only traveling at about 17 mph - I should have
been knock out and dead - like I did a belly flop onto concrete. But I landed my canopy and went about my biz...
...about two hours later I nearly crapped.

So your perception of reality was distorted. You
acknowledge that it was distorted. There was a reason: fear of immediate death. Does that experience make you mistrust your senses generally? If so, why?


But that fear didn't catch up to me until about two hours after the fact. In the split second the event was happening I can still describe to you the three courses of action I considered, and the one I eventually chose, to this day. I was calm and rational during the event. I only fell apart afterward.

Yes - it gives me pause to think that my senses are not always accurate and/or reliable, and they aren't. No one's are - not always, in all circumstances. Another example is flying on instruments - I'm also a pilot. You have to learn to completely ignore your senses to do that, because your perception of reality may become totally misinformed by them when you are deprived of one of them. Yet both what the instruments tell you and what you feel are "real" - you have to make a choice.

--snip--
'Objective evidence' is the bullet hole. No amount of belief will make it go away, or make one appear if none exists.
I can make it go away in court if I think you've made an error in the judgment of it's size, for example.
You can 'make it go away' by covering your eyes,
too. Hint: it doesn't really go away :-)
It does if it kills you... at least, that's what I like to think.

Do you have a point here?


Yeah - death "cures" everything by making it "go away".

--snip--
(Heinlein's 'Stranger In a Strange Land' - someone
asks a Fair Witness "What color is that house?" The Witness replies, "It's white on this side." IOW, saying no more than is observable, giving no opinions, making no assumptions. A neat concept :-))
Yeah - and I contend that's harder than it sounds.
It's almost impossible. That's why the concept stuck
with me.
We'll, that's about what I've been trying to say.

I agree that being objective is difficult-to-impossible. We've been disagreeing on objective evidence.


"Objective evidence" requires "objectivity" to interpret or comprehend. One without the other is pointless, and the latter is "difficult to impossible" in your own words. So "objective evidence" is pretty tricky to come up with.

Got a lecture on the "validity and utility of eyewitness testimony" during that voir dire I sat...
very hard to validate such, much harder than I'd have previously believed. Very easy to impeach an eyewitness.
Yup. Objective evidence, when available, is vastly
more... well, objective :-)
...if you can get it.

Bullet hole.


Interpretation.

I agree that total objectivity is rare, if not impossible.
We all bring experiences to a perception, and they have to color it. This does NOT mean there's no such thing as objective evidence. They're two different things.
But another case of not being able to have one without the other, I think.
Objective evidence can exist without observers.
Perceptions can exist that have no basis in reality.
The two are independant.
I think they are highly dependent - you would have to assume a pre-drawn conclusion otherwise.

Explain that. Coherently, if possible :-)


In your description, only one conclusion can be drawn from truly "objective evidence" - that assumes a pre-drawn conclusion. I hold that many differing conclusions might be drawn from any set of evidence based on the POV of the individual interpreting it. If there are no observers, the "evidence" doesn't even really exist, because no one is there to perceive it. You can't have one without the other, and you can't assume a conclusion based upon a single POV.

--snip--
That's why the bullet hole is objective evidence - it doesn't change regardless of who looks at it with what bias, or whether they're being 'objective'.
It may not change,
Bingo. That's what makes it 'objective' evidence.

but the conclusions drawn from it may vary.
Those conclusions are subjective.

That's not "objective" in my book,
It's not. It's subjective.

because the conclusions should always be as absolute as the hole - but they aren't.
That's why objectivity is an ideal.
NOW we're gettin' somewhere... I conjecture it's an very illusive if not unattainable ideal.

And I've agreed. We disagree on evidence being
objective.


Hand in hand. I don't consider "objective evidence" to be as straight-forward a proposition as you put fourth.

--snip--
For those that don't care, it was never there in teh first place.
There's our difference: 'for those that don't care'. There's a hole in the guy's forehead or there isn't.
Yes - to some there is, to some there may not be, and to still more there "may" be.

Those are viewpoints. Think about the bullet hole.
Does it appear or disappear depending on who's
thinking about it? No.


Yes, it does. If I cease thinking about it, or am instructed not to think about it, it might as well not exist. But only for me.

--snip--
If they think they're 20' tall and have super powers,
and they're not, it's fantasy. Period. No matter how
'real' it seems to them. It's only their perception of
reality, and it's whacked. Anyone can look at them and see they're 5'4" tall, overweight, balding, with no super powers. Any of this can be verified by anyone.
I take it you've never actually encountered such a person... I have. A few of them. Believe me - it don't matter one whit to them what you "verify"...

I have known a few. No, it doesn't matter to them what 'reality' is outside their heads. They've gotten so involved with their fantasy that it seems real - to them. But the fact that they believe something doesn't make it real outside their heads.


Doesn't make it real to US outside their heads, but only because we refuse to share their "vision". It's only "fantasy" from our POV.

--snip--
I can't believe you're hanging on to this 'reality is
whatever I think it is' delusion. "Reality is that which,
when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." (Philip K Dick)
Bingo. But if you never stop believing, it never goes away either.

In that case there would be no 'belief' involved.


Not really, your world would be founded on belief. But most people's are...

>From theirs it's their reality.

Our perceptions of reality are, or can be, subjective, but our perceptions are not reality.
I'd contend that our perceptions are reality, and that without them there IS no "reality".

So... before humans, there was - what? Static?
I think you have a lot of your eggs in this 'reality is
whatever I say it is' basket.


Everyone does. There's a lot of us, so yes - there's a lot of eggs. but I still hold that without perception, "reality" is simply nothing. No matter who or what is there to perceive it - humans, animals, it still has to be perceived to be "real" within a context. Or even to be given context.

So...once you are able to tell me verifiably the exact time of the origin of the universe, then go back and let me know what was going on a few minutes before. I'll contend that was "nothing".

I've known a couple people like this. After talking
to them for a while, you can tell they look at a tree, say, and see a pig. It's unsettling. Usually they don't go so far as to test it in any way - they don't try to feed or chase the 'pig'.
Yes, it is unsettling... because it forces you to have
to prove to yourself that you're "right" and they're "wrong".

Usually what tips you off that there's something awry
is a situation that does exactly that - their 'reality' has
bumped up against actual reality, and shown a gross
misalignment. It's unsettling (to me) because people
who are seeing some other 'reality' are unpredictable.


Define "actual" in context between two such individuals. Each has their own perception, and yours is just as unsettling to them as theirs is to you. If you lived in their world, they might be completely predictable - and that's why you have to put yourself in their place in order to deal with them, weather that's unsettling, or "real", or not. That takes practice.

We don't really encounter many situations on a daily basis where we really genuinely are forced to substantiate our own version of "reality", do we? When we do it's unsettling - or to get more technical, causes a bit of "cognitive dissonance".

Only if our 'version' clashes with the part of reality we
happened to trip over. The bus comes to mind. Even people with bizarre 'realities' tend to avoid testing them if the result is likely to hurt them. Some of them
don't seem to mind hurting other people, though...


I'm reminded of a portion of a painting that's on the cover of Van Halen's "Fair Warning" album - in it, a boy has taken a butcher knife and skinned one of his arms to the bone...to uncover and explore the "reality" beneath what he can see. My ex was a cutter during her childhood, which was pretty brutal. I've probably known more than one...I know I've corresponded with a few in a support group I used to frequent. What I mostly recall is that some cutters cut themselves because "reality" fails to provide a required amount of stimulation. There are others that do it because they live through situations that teach them that brutality and pain are "normal". I could probably say something similar about anorexics. But they all have their own reasons.

Anyway, the only diff is that some turn outward, and some turn inward.

What I've found is that about the best way to deal with these people is to place yourself in their context for "reality" in order to find a basis to talk to or shepherd them. That takes a bit of practice, and I've become better at dealing with those of my family members that require such than most of my family that don't get that. It takes practice, but once you
learn how to slip back and fourth it can teach you a lot about people - even "normal" people.

Have you read Pirsig's "Lila"? He goes on at some
length about 'sanity' and 'reality'.


No - haven't heard of that one.

--snip--
All any "reality" IS is someone's hallucination -
Tell that to the guy with the bullet hole in his
forehead, or his wife and kids, or the guy who got flattened by the bus.
You could but I doubt it would do any good...
everyone get to cling to the strength of their own, and that's why "objectivity" is so elusive.

Maybe because kids are taught magical thinking,
that 'believing makes it so", "you can be anything
you want to be", etc. Reality doesn't care what you
believe. If you're tone deaf, you'll never be a great
singer.


....but you may learn to play guitar flawlessly. Generally, believing does make it so. But a lot of us get talked out of believing in the positive and get caught in the negative. Or lose our ability or drive to believe altogether.

--snip--
Suppose I though I was a fish, and jumped into a
river and drown because I can't swim. In my mind, I died a fish... what's the "reality"?

Fish can swim. You're not a fish. Your perceptions were whacked. No matter what you believe in your head, it doesn't change reality. If you say "it's real to ME", that's great. Just don't expect it to work for anyone else in the real world.


And I don't. But if I die because I can't swim because I'm not a fish, I'm still a fish in my mind and no one will ever prove any different to me. And that all that mattered in my world, and my version of reality.

And from who's POV, because in the end it's only
the POV that provides the "reality".

Reality is there with your POV, my POV, or none. We're only perceiving it.


Correct. And we don't all perceive it the same way, and so for each of us "reality" is something different.

--snip--
We have two "realities" between us - God exists/
God doesn't exist. Independent of the question or
the answer, that is each of our "realities".

There is one reality. We look at it two different ways. You look at it and think it includes a god. I don't.
Hopefully your 'reality' agrees with me on the bus, at least.


It may today, it may not tomorrow...that's the nature of reality.

Going to the movies is probably the best example of a mass shared altering of reality I can think of - "suspension of belief" is stock and trade of the entertainment industry. But while that belief is suspended, the movie becomes the "reality".

A movie or book is a glimpse of how someone else views reality, and most people can distinguish reality from fantasy.


Yeah...most. Not all. And even at the movies, the show becomes reality for everyone there until it's over.

People alter their "realities" constantly, and through many means.

They alter the way they look at reality.


Same thing - it's all about perception.

Culture alters reality - BIG time, and is probably the single biggest reason Americans have such a hard time "understanding" the rest of the world.

Culture at least partially determines the way we
LOOK at reality.


I think it determines "reality" to the greatest extent. The "reality" in the USA is certainly not the "reality" of Juarez, Mexico - or any of the border towns across the Rio Grande if you've ever driven Route 10 through El Paso and glanced across the river.

If you can't be "rational" enough to both perceive and step into someone else's reality from time to time how are you gonna find any understanding of them?

Not rational; empathetic.

The Repair Guy repairguy1993 dot netfirms dot com


"Rational" enough to know how to make the attempt, "empathetic" enough to try and understand.

--
- Rufus
.

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